England Women 3-0 Ukraine Women: The Lionesses want to lose to Spain as they question how one defeat cost them a World Cup place | Football news

Sarina Wiegman and many of England’s stars have disappointed a ‘difficult’ World Cup qualifier after failing to secure an automatic place at next year’s tournament despite winning five of their six games.

The Lionesses beat Ukraine 3-0 in the final qualifier and finished with 15 points out of a possible 18 in Group A3.

While that would have been enough to top Group A1 and A2, their 4-0 loss to Spain in the fifth game meant the reigning world champions took first place with a superior head-to-head record and goal difference.

England beat Spain 1-0 in April at Wembley, but were played off the park in Mallorca in the away game. And Wiegman asked how it was that the World Cup holders and European champions were drawn in the same qualifying group.

“If you look at a team, like the United Nations, the competition is really high.

“What I’m disappointed about is that we’ve won five games, we have 15 points and we’re in a group with the European champions, in a group with the world champions, and that you can’t get in. Yes, a night like this was a good night of football, but I’m not really happy.

“I’m happy with the way we played, but not that we have to go to the play-offs, but that’s the way it is and we’ll be ready.”

Russo and Charles frustrated by ‘tough team’

Striker Alessia Russo he talked about the difficulty of facing Spain in the qualifiers, he admitted that it was difficult not to go through even though they only lost one game.

“I think it’s clear that we all know we didn’t play well enough against Spain,” Russo said Sky Sports. They also put in an amazing performance and all credit to them.

“We know that the performance was below our standard, so I think that disappointed us. We wanted to book a place in the World Cup but now we are going to the play-offs. That is difficult but it is football. We had the toughest team against Spain.

“I think we have won five out of six games but we haven’t passed. It’s hard but it’s football. We’re moving and we’re going to the play-offs and we’re going to do everything we can to qualify.”

The protector Niamh Charles he was included in the starting XI against Ukraine and shared the same feeling after the game.

He said: “Spain is an amazing team. If you look at our games, it shows that the two top teams were playing in the group together. We were unlucky to miss out.”

‘When is 15 points not enough?’

Group A of the league, which England would not have topped with 15 points, was Group A, which made Germany finish with 16 points. However, the Lions would have held their own had they been in that group, having won their last two games against them, including the Euro 2022 final.

Talking to ITV After the match, both Beth Mead and Georgia Stanway questioned how the reigning European champions could have missed out on an 80 percent win rate.

“It’s rare that you get 15 points and not get out of the game,” Stanway said. I think it shows our quality, our consistency but we know that our performance against Spain was not good enough and today we got a reaction. “

Mead added: “It’s worrying. You know, there aren’t many teams that don’t win by 15 points, that’s the nature of the competition at the moment, even when you’re in the group with Spain.

“It’s very difficult, and unfortunately, we finished second, and we’re going to the playoffs, but we’re always motivated to make it that way.”